


i find it hard to tell you (i find it hard to take)

by Emmar



Series: the bravest and the boldest [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Autism Spectrum Character, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-15
Updated: 2014-03-15
Packaged: 2018-01-15 19:49:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1317154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emmar/pseuds/Emmar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some people are a trial, and some... aren't.</p><p>(A side-story in my disabled Marauders series, introducing an autistic Lily Evans and a socially-anxious Severus Snape.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	i find it hard to tell you (i find it hard to take)

**Author's Note:**

> I do not claim to be an authority on autism, but a lot of this is based on my personal experience living with Asperger's Syndrome - though I also have a host of other mental health issues, and figuring out what's from the AS and what's from the OCD or ADHD is hard work, so this may not all be accurate for many other people on the autistic spectrum.
> 
> P.S.: If you think Snape was irredeemable at the age of eleven, this series is not going to be for you.

Lunch is-- a trial. Lily separates her sausages from her beans and her beans from her chips and lines them up, carefully, trying to ignore the argument floating over her head. Some of the upper years are fighting about-- something, Lily doesn’t know what, but they’re so _loud_ , and how is she supposed to concentrate like this, and why won’t they just--

“Stop it!” she bursts out, slamming her cutlery down on the table and staring at nothing. “Just-- stop fighting, for the love of god!”

Then she gets to her feet and bolts from the hall, left turn, left turn, right turn, into an empty classroom, and she presses herself into the left hand corner, arms wrapped tightly around her legs, chin propped on her knees, taking deep breaths. The door creaks open not much later, and Sev comes in and sits next to her, not touching her, just _there_ , and fishes a couple of pieces of parchment out of his robes, perfectly squared off, and hands one to her. She smooths it out against the stone floor and begins folding, seeing him do the same out of the corner of her eye. They do it for different reasons, she knows - for her, it’s about the precision, about getting it _right_ , and for him, it’s more about the motions themselves, something for his hands to do.

As she folds the nose of her crane, Sev grins and flourishes a fortune-teller under her nose, flicking it open and closed, and she laughs, startled.

“So,” he says, flicking the fortune-teller open and closed, open and closed, “what are you going to wish for?”  
“Well,” she replies, picking up the crane and turning it over in her hands carefully, “if I tell you, it won’t come true, will it?”  
“I thought that was just for blowing out candles.”  
“Wishing on shooting stars, too. So probably cranes as well.”  
“Ah. Alright.”

They’re silent a while longer, then Sev levers himself to his feet, folds the fortune-teller up small and stows it away in a pocket, and says, “You alright to go back to your common room?”  
“Yeah,” she says, brushing dust off of her knees as she stands, then gives him a quick hug. He pats her on the back gently, just once.  
“See you in Potions?”  
“See you.”

When she gets back to Gryffindor, the common room is half-empty, the only first years the four boys, and the one-armed one - Lupin - gets up when he sees her, offers up a paper bag. When she opens it, she finds a ham sandwich, cut into neat quarters, and there’s a blush creeping up her neck as she darts him a look.

“I saw you rush out at lunch,” is all he says, rubbing at the back of his neck.  
“Thanks,” she whispers, and he gives her a smile and a shrug and goes back to his friends. One of the boys - Black, she thinks - leans over and signs something to Lupin, laughing, and Lupin punches him in the shoulder.

 _Boys_ , she thinks.


End file.
